Wednesday, November 19, 2008

Caracas Daily Journal (Jeremy Morgan): The case in which a relative of late president Raul Leoni was killed and another injured is now thought to have involved a contracted killer and inheritance greed.

The scientific and investigative police, Cicpc, have arrested a man named as Anderson Alexis Gandica, who is said to be nicknamed El Toche, (hill billy), as the actual killer. He’s said to have confessed and looked less than certain about his future as top cops carefully paraded him before the media as he was taken to court to be ordered held at La Planta prison in Caracas.

Police say that Raul Enrique Moreno Leoni, 32, hired Gandica to kill his sister, Lorena Moreno Leoni (she was) and his mother, Sofia Leoni de Moreno, who was injured. The family had come into an inheritance and Moreno Leoni apparently wanted not only his share but theirs, too.

Gandica told reporters that the brother had offered to pay him and two other men $50,000 each to wipe out the relatives. The bloodbath inside the mother’s home could have been worse. Gandica said the deal involved murdering four people including a three-year-old child and a tenant who was out at the time. Afterwards, he said he was glad that at least he'd saved the child.

Gandica had worked as a gardener for the family for several years, and afterwards as a waiter in Las Mercedes. There, he's said to have met Henry Bastos, 33, the man he asked to join him in the actual killing.

Police arrested Gandica in his home state of Tachira, where he'd fled after the killing. Now, they're on the track of Bastos and a third man known only as Robert, who was to do the driving. The supposed instigator, the brother, is said to have lived in Miami for five years. It’s said that a warrant was out for his arrest for fraud, and it's alleged that he'd once planned to murder his wife for the life insurance.